Efficient and Convenient Digital Melting Point Apparatus
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Melting point apparatus are used to determine sample melt and are used for applications in pharmaceutical labs, quality control, academia, chemistry and industrial labs, particularly for the purity checking of raw materials received and compounds produced. They are often used to determine the temperature of the melting point of a substance. It is usual to carry out a melting point determination and check for consistency with at least a further two tests. These tests are undertaken in capillary tubes.
The Stuart® SMP50 Automatic Digital Melting Point Apparatus can analyze three samples simultaneously, which can be captured and displayed as a video image of the melt on a large 7” touchscreen display, either straight away or at a more convenient time.
Renaud Foret, Category Manager, explained some of the key attributes of this device: “The SMP50, conforms to US Pharmacopeia (USP) and GLP requirements, and can accurately identify the melting point with its’ advanced digital image processing capability. If you are unsure of the melt temperature, use the rapid ramp mode to take a fast scan of the full temperature range. Set-up is easy and intuitive due to the Android™ menu system. You can take measurements, view results, save programs, set up user sign-ins, and download time-stamped videos and reports to a USB flash drive. Furthermore, there is a storage compartment for unused capillaries, which includes a glass cutter to open capillaries that are closed on both ends, and an area to hold three prepared sample capillaries safely away from the heat source.”
When using the Stuart® SMP50 Automatic Digital Melting Point Apparatus it is important to prepare samples correctly. For accurate melting point determinations, it is recommended that three samples of the same material are prepared in the same way and analyzed at the same time. The average of the results from the three capillaries can then be reported as the melting point of the sample. During this whole process it is important to: ensure that there is no sample on the outside of the tube before inserting it into the melting point apparatus; use a sample only once as some substances chemically decompose on heating; heat the sample slowly at 1-2ºC/minute; and perform a rapid melt with a ramp of up to 20ºC/minute if the melting point is unknown. Once the approximate melting point is known, a more appropriate plateau can be set, and a slower ramp rate used.
